There is no doubt that consumer behavior is changing at a fast pace, especially with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, it has become more important than ever to do proper research on the keywords. This will help you in understanding the latest shifts in the consumer intent.
Most of the SEO professionals know how to find out insights from the Google Search Console. They know which keywords have helped them in getting more traffic, increase rankings, and enhance visibility in the past. However, it is time to think outside the box.
Thus, you have to find out the resources that didn’t exist before March 11, 2020. In this blog today, we are going to tell you about the 7 Google tools. These tools will help you in your keyword research and SEO.
1. Rising Retail Categories
In May 2020, Google launched a brand new and interactive tool which is known as Rising Retail Categories. This tool helps us in understanding the following;
- The rising retail categories in Google Search
- The locations where the searches are increasing
- The associated queries
For instance, in the last 6 months, the top trending searches in the US have been sprinkler control, sneeze guards, neck gaiters, household disinfectants, and protective masks. In this way, you can focus on the top trending categories month-to-month. If you are making any of these products, then it is time to look for the key trends. Trust me; you will become a hero in the retail market sector overnight.
2. Coronavirus search trends
There has been a massive spike in the search topics related to coronavirus, COVID-19. This has been an ongoing trend from February to May. After that, the search interest in coronavirus has reduced and come below weather searches. However, it still remains above the search topics of music and sports.
3. The US economy and Covid-19
Google has recently created a section of the Coronavirus Search Trends on the US economy and COVID-19. This includes analysis of how the Coronavirus has affected the searches and comparing them with the past searches.
If you keep scrolling down, you will see the search interest in the recession since 2004. If you further scroll down, you will see the spikes in different search interests in other terms like unemployment benefits, food banks, mortgage forbearance, food stamps, and more.
You can check the map of the country to see which search terms are used the most in which locations.
4. Shopping insights
In October 2015, Google launched the Shopping Insights feature. This is a very useful feature as it helps you to see how your clients or company stack up against your competitors. It will help you track the competing products in your category.
This is a life-saving feature, especially in these extraordinary times. There is no doubt that this year’s disruptions are making it tough for retailers to do business. Here is where the benefits of Shopping Insights come in.
The Shopping Insights help in staying updated on what the shopper wants. Thus, you can follow the trends in their category. Now, the question is, how does Google provide the shopping insights? According to Think with Google, 63% of the shopping scenarios include shoppers doing online research before purchasing.
Doesn’t matter whether they shop online or offline, the research before shopping is done online. Thus, with daily search data for more than 55,000 products, 45,000 brands, and 5000 categories, the Shopping Insights will help in understanding the customers in a better way. Once you get to know their intent, you can make more informed decisions throughout both online and offline channels.
5. Market Finder
In November 2017, Google launched Market Finder. It has become a game-changer while helping clients in navigating through the present scenario. When you enter the URL of any organization in the Market Finder, you will be able to calculate the regions that offer the best opportunities for similar services depending on the key metrics/filters of your chosen categories.
For instance, if it is a school or university, it will show you all the regions that offer the best growth and career opportunities. This is a significant surprise because it comes as a shift from the geographic trends before the pandemic.
6. Google Surveys
Google Consumer Surveys was launched in the year 2012. It got renamed as Google Surveys in 2016. At present, it has become one of the most essential tools to get valuable insights on the target audiences. This is a market research tool that gathers data from the survey questions you use.
The web users answer your survey questions for accessing high-quality content on the Google Display Network. In return for it, the publishers get paid for it because their users answer the questions. Google then compiles and analyzes the answers through a simple online interface.
Yes, you can use the Search Console but they will not tell you “why” people are using those queries. This is why you should use Google Surveys. Google surveys help in uncovering the search intent. This is much more valuable.
Google Surveys will help you get answers much more quickly. And the best part is, it is cheap. The prices start at $0.10 per complete survey. Keyword research will help in choosing a keyword phrase for optimizing the title and Meta description of a landing page.
Google Surveys help in ensuring that the content on the landing page is optimized to address the consumer intent. This is important because you can do much more than generating organic search traffic. Different SEO strategies can help you in generating organic search traffic which converts leads.
7. Google Trends
Google Trends was launched in 2005 and this is why it is the oldest tool. A lot of SEO professionals don’t use it too often because it doesn’t offer any data on the organic search volumes. However, these are not normal times. Finding insights that can be processed within a very short time after it happened in the real world, is something that will get the SEO professionals a competitive edge. The worldwide keyword search terms with “best” and “cheap” have increased steadily in the last 16 and a half years.
It is important to create and optimize new content using these keywords because that is what your customers are searching for. Thus, on one hand, the COVID-19 crisis represents a threat and an opportunity too. Thus, you don’t have to use traditional tools for digital marketing.
